When I wasn’t playing baseball, I watched baseball games on television, or I played baseball video games. I even got to go to a few professional games. My favorite baseball players are Ken Griffey Jr. of the Seattle Mariners, Sandy Alomar of the Cleveland Indians, and Brett Boone of the Atlanta Braves. Whenever I am on the baseball diamond, I dream of making plays and hitting the ball like those guys. When I told my dad this, he smiled and said “Son when I was your age, I dreamt the same thing, only my heroes were not allowed to play in the major leagues.”

I asked him why not, and he replied “only the ball was white.” Puzzled and not understanding what he meant, I asked him to explain. He said, “Rodney, there was a time in America when none of

process due to quotas) the fans began to lose interest in the Negro leagues.

Buck Leonard-First Basemen-Homestead Grays – lifetime BA .341

They went to Brooklyn’s Ebbets Field to see Jackie Robinson and to the

and the Negro leagues, which was a bad thing.” I asked him why, and he said, “it was good because it opened the door for Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Willie Mays, and all the other black ballplayers who followed. It made baseball a better game and paved the way for other ethnic groups to play the game. However, integration erased an institution, which made a direct financial contribution to the black community owned by having black ball clubs. These clubs in turn had black managers, general

greatly. Some owners were in financial trouble and fans could not afford to

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